Youth held for duping doctor of Rs 7 lakh

A STAFF REPORTER

A youth in his late 20s was arrested on Tuesday from Patuli, on the southern fringes of the city, for allegedly duping a Kerala-based doctor of Rs 7 lakh.

Ajay Bhadra was picked up by a team of officers from Ernakulam. He is accused of siphoning off the amount from the doctor’s account using the latter’s Internet banking password. He has reportedly confessed to the crime.

According to the cops, the doctor had lodged a complaint that Rs 7 lakh had been siphoned off from his account. He had told the police he had received an email from someone posing as a bank executive and that he wanted details of his account for a “security upgrade”.

Using these details, Ajay transferred Rs 7 lakh to an account he had opened a fortnight ago, said a Kerala officer.

Ajay — the son of Trinamul leader Ratna Bhadra, the president of the party’s Ward No. 89 unit — had no idea he could easily be traced from the Internet Protocol (IP) address of the computer he had used to send the email and withdraw the money from the doctor’s account.

“He thought no one could trace him. He confessed to his crime during interrogation,” said an officer of Kerala police.

“The IP address helped us get the name of Ajay’s Internet service provider. After that, it was very easy to find out which computer had been used to conduct the fraud,” the officer added.

The police team raided Ajay’s home and arrested him. The cops have taken him to Kerala, where he will be produced in court.

nRape arrest: An 18-year-old was arrested early on Tuesday for allegedly raping a 22-year-old woman at her Bhadreswar home on Monday afternoon. Police sources said Swarup Ghosh was a friend of the victim’s sister.